Tuesday, June 8, 2010

Peter's Music





This morning when I left for my 37.5 mile ride I had the thought, "Gee, this new tube is blown up so much it feels like I'm riding on my rims." Then, I looked down to see that I WAS riding on my rim. Crap! My new back tube was a dud...it was leaking a bit when we put it on. So, for the 4th time in the last week I went over to Coventry Cycle...20 minutes and 11 bucks later...I was on my way.

Yesterday, I thought it might be fun to ride up to the Columbia River, along it, and then down to the Springwater and out to Gresham. Because of this flat and some very frustrating attempts to revive my now disabled ipod, that wasn't going to be possible. I still had time to do a nice ride, though, so I wasn't too unhappy.

Peter said I could borrow his MP3 player which is a beast so I started with the last thing that he had been playing: Louise Attaque's See You Later Alligator. Right away, I could tell this was going to be a fun ride. Peter has a much more voracious appetite for music than I do. I think I have only surprised him once with a new band. I listened to this album twice and it got me all the way to the place where we had stopped for sandwiches on Saturday's ride.

At this little cement structure was a woman feeding the birds. We got to talking and apparently she feeds the birds every day riding her bike to get too and from this spot. Then, she took off and I decided I needed some new tunes. I looked at Peter's playlist and saw one labeled "Driving With Sara" with 128 songs. Awww, how sweet.

So I started back down the Columbia (really flying now because I had a tailwind) listening to Autolux. About a mile after I get started I see the bird lady. She's texting or something and pretty swervy so I yell out as loud as I could, "On your left!" I must have surprised her when I passed though because she started yelling and swearing at me as I rode away. "Bird lady's got a mouth on her," I thought and continued riding east. The whole bike path is framed by beautiful tall grass which every once in a while whips my calf. It's idyllic.

Autolux was getting pretty brooding so I switched to Black Rebel Motorcycle Club. Getting better. Then the album Parklife came on by Blur. I love Blur and listened to most of the album making my way back south. The sun has really come out now and I'm feeling good. I am, however, a dirty, sticky mess because I doused myself in sunblock after getting pretty burnt Saturday.

Just as I make my way home, climbing over Tabor, Eels comes on. "This playlist just gets better as it goes along," I think. Rotten World Blues, and Last Stop: This Town are great songs, but when I make it past Tabor and start the easy last 4 miles to home Mr. E's Beautiful Blues comes on and I'm almost giddy. Endorphin high + Sunshine + The lyrics: "Goddamn right it's a beautiful day" = One very happy cyclist. Oh yeah.

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